Another Righthaven Copyright Troll Lawsuit Dismissed as Sham

Righthaven Had No Authority to Bring Claims Against Former Prosecutor Tad DiBiase

Las Vegas - For the second time in a week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has won the dismissal of an infringement case filed by copyright troll Righthaven LLC.

EFF, along with the law firm of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati and attorney Chad Bowers, represent Thomas DiBiase in Righthaven v. DiBiase. Righthaven had sued DiBiase, a former prosecutor, for a post on his blog that provides resources for prosecutors in difficult murder cases where the victim is presumed dead but no body is found. A document unearthed by EFF in a related case showed that the copyright assignment was a sham and that Righthaven was merely agreeing to undertake the Las Vegas Review-Journal newspaper's case at its own expense in exchange for a cut of the recovery.

Echoing his earlier decision, Judge Hunt ruled Wednesday that Righthaven did not have the legal authorization to bring a copyright lawsuit, because it never owned the copyright in the first place.

"We are pleased that the Court again saw through Righthaven's sham assignment of the copyright and dismissed its improper claim," said Kurt Opsahl, Senior Staff Attorney at EFF. "Now that the truth about its copyright ownership has been exposed, Righthaven's house of cards is falling apart."

DiBiase said, "I'm happy to get back to the job of assisting police and prosecutors with these difficult murder cases and not fighting frivolous lawsuits concocted to make a quick buck."

Just last week, the judge also dismissed Righthaven v. Democratic Underground, a similar case where EFF is representing the defendant. On Monday, Judge Phillip Pro agreed with Judge Hunt and dismissed Righthaven v. Hoehn, a case against a Vietnam war veteran.

For the full opinion in Righthaven v. DiBiase:
https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/righthaven_v_dib/dibiaseorder62211.pdf